Woodland's Kingsley sets state passing mark in win over Seymour

Andrew Frosceno

Updated 12:23 am, Thursday, November 22, 2012

BEACON FALLS -- Woodland junior quarterback Tanner Kingsley passed for a state-record 615 yards and eight touchdowns in leading the Hawks to a 62-26 win over Seymour in the season finale for both teams Wednesday night.

"It's probably one of the best feelings I've ever had playing sports," Kingsley said. "We wanted to just run good offense. Scirpo (Anthony Scirpo) and all my wide receivers, the linemen, everything worked out good tonight."

"We knew they had a lot of offensive firepower," he said. "So we were going to try to mix some things up and they did a great job of adjusting to whatever we did. They made big plays. We thought we'd have to gamble defensively, and unfortunately we lost on a lot of spots when we did."

After Woodland jumped out to a quick 14-0 lead on a 70-yard touchdown pass to Rahmi Rountree on the Hawks' first play from scrimmage and a 39-yard pass to Scirpo, the Wildcats fought back. Quarterback Mike Conlan hit Jack Briggs for a 22-yard touchdown pass and Joseph Salemme took an end-around 55 yards for a score to tie the game at 14.

Woodland came right back with Kingsley's third touchdown as he hit Scirpo for a 65-yard touchdown with 1:08 left in the half. Seymour drove down to the Hawks' 15-yard line with less than five seconds left in the half but was unable to punch it in the end zone.

Seymour was never able to get closer as two straight Kingsley touchdown passes to open the second half gave Woodland a 35-14 lead.

"In the first half we were able to get after them and cause a few turnovers," Lennon said. "In the second half they adjusted and we weren't getting the turnovers, they were making the big plays. "

Offensively for the Wildcats, Conlan threw for three touchdowns, including one to fellow senior Jimmy Vartelas.

Vartelas praised his fellow senior class members and talked about what the future holds for the underclassmen.

"We had great leadership throughout the senior class," he said. "The Wildcats will be over .500 next year because there is a great bunch of underclassmen back."

Lennon praised Conlan's play in his final game.

"No. 3 (Conlan) played his tail off," he said. "He made a lot of plays for us. He's had a great year and I'm proud of him."